


The Space Between the Stars

by Go1dwords



Category: Original Work
Genre: Alter egos essentially, How Do I Tag, I almost forgot, Let's try this shall we, M/M, Mercenaries, My First Work in This Fandom, NaNoWriMo 2018, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Outer Space, Planets, Protocols, Space Cowboys - Freeform, Space Pirates, Space inaccuracies, That's what I was going for but it probably didn't work, Venganza is my mood, Violence, gays in space, kind of?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-08
Updated: 2019-10-27
Packaged: 2020-01-06 13:46:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 18,893
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18389630
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Go1dwords/pseuds/Go1dwords
Summary: It's been a day since he last ate. A week since he fixed the engines. A month since he touched solid ground. A lifetime away from ever finding love.Somehow, Matias always manages to screw his own life over, majorly.





	1. Coffee at 2:79 A.M.

**Author's Note:**

> Whoop whoop! First work on AO3, and it's not a fanfiction? How is this possible?  
> (Kudos to all you fanfiction writers out there. Imma sit back and be your angst and gays sponge. Hit me with all you've got.)
> 
> I think I may be losing some brain cells if I don't leave this here. *Knocks on skull*
> 
> Enjoy! I hope I do this story justice.

There was no sound in space.

Because space had no medium, that was a _rule_. It was a vacuum; empty space that slurped up sound like humans slurped up noodles. It suggested that those noodles - or, sound, in this case - never existed in the first place, no matter its origin, even if they are from something as sophisticated as a sonic blast.

(Though, to be fair, sonic blasts are hardly the most accurate things in the universe; even if they _did_  manage to hit something, it's not like anyone could hear it, not with billions upon billions of miles worth of void stretching between one system and the next.)

But, evidently, that doesn’t apply when the blast hits something that has someone alive _in it_. The little Extravagance-Class ship - the only one that was this far out from any known star system, bordering the edge of space pirate territory, and definitely _in_ space wasteland - was drifting along peacefully before it suddenly rocketed sideways, careening off-course and proceeded to scare the shit out of the man underneath the white-hot engine.

The sound-that-should-not-exist shook the entire ship and startled Matias Marino into jumping slightly from where he was on the floor of the engine-cum-control room with a shout and smacking his head against solid metal plating, just barely missing the 400 something degrees engine core by inches.

The muffled shout came from the little panel that had been removed from the side of the engine, which took up the other two-thirds of the room, the bottom half of a torso and two legs peeking out from inside the machinery jerking as their owner managed to hurt himself. The banging sound of skull on metal reverberated in a ringing wave around the room, where hundreds of newspaper clippings and charred pieces of metal lay haphazardly across the ground, in an array of what would have been the world’s most dangerous game of “the ground is lava.” The "windshield" of the spaceship spanned the length of the room that was filled with keys, buttons, and levers, most of them unused but clean, and the distant, swirling galaxies and faraway worlds twinkled, as if saying hi.

“Ow! What in the Hells-,” Matias Marino swore, pressing his hand to his sweaty forehead as he slowly slid out from underneath the metal tubes and electrical wires, eyes darting around to make sure nothing in the engine room had fallen over from their messily organized and stacked piles. A giant, red lump had formed over his brow, and he scowled when he pressed on it and it hurt; it just meant that there was definitely going to be a bruise tomorrow, “What the hell was that, Ven?”

‘A super-fusion plasma shot from 200 meters away. Why?’ Asked the innocent and cheerful metallic voice that had replaced the soft retro-style music that had been spouting out from the overhead speakers. Even after years of developing her code and then letting her quote unquote “adaptability” run across every language system this side of the universe, Venganza’s voice and audio calibration was still definitively unnatural, a robotic twang still audible under the layers and layers of tones and synthetic vibrations and sounds, most of which were created to try to make her sound more human, less machine, of which zero of them worked. Nonetheless, Venganza was still evidently (or so Matias stubbornly believed) more high-tech than any other AI of this age, even if her "voice" wasn't as smooth as if Matias decided to upgrade the voice box to a newer model.

For the record, Matias thought the imperfections were nice; it was almost as if she had an accent, and it went along nicely with his own South Earthen twang.

“What the ‘ell?!” Alarmed, Matias jumped to his feet, forgetting about his forehead, and smacked both palms against the control panel as he peered through the windows of the ship, into what seemed like never-ending blackness, “Super-fusion plasma? Are there pirates attakin’ us? Why are we still in ‘cruise’ instead o’ runnin’?”

‘Don't get your panties in a twist, amigo, we're three seconds from a rift,’ As she speaks, Venganza’s robotic snark seemed to signal the beginning of the change of the lighting, the overhead bulbs dimming as her AI programming preps the shop for interdimensional travel, ‘And no, that was just a prototype. No space pirate has enough money to actually get real plasma-slag shots. Knowledge, mon ami. This is why I’m the captain here, Matias,’ she sing-songs, ‘You just sit back and enjoy the show.’

“You’re not the captain. I’m the captain. And I’d be more inclined to watch the show if it means I don’t die today,” Matias peeled himself off the window with a sigh of relief and kicked a random path through the piles upon piles of miscellaneous things scattered about the floor as Ven hummed a tune through rift-travel, her coded voice occasionally cracking out and fizzing in static as time went still around the ship and the stars got brighter before Matias’s ears popped and light suddenly engulfed them.

‘Ah, but you’re not dead, are you? See, only good things happen when I’m the captain,’ Ven said, suddenly, sounding smug as the whiteness fades into black again, the space between the stars smaller, somehow, ‘Who’s steering the ship? Who’s actually the one getting you where you need to be going instead of walking straight into your death? Who’s the one that keeps you up in the air when you’re passed out from all that  _stuff-that-shall-not-be-mentioned_ in your room?’

“Hey! A man’s gotta enjoy himself sometimes!” Matias protested with no actual shame - he had lost that long ago along with most of his brain cells- as he dropped a thin tool that he was using to pick at the crevices of the engine with a clang, adding to the mess on the floor, “And stop using the audio in m'room!”

‘There’s no audio in your room. I can hear noises from the hallway.’

Matias chucked an oil-slicked rag up towards the overhead speaker and scowled, “Ya coulda just turned the audio off.”

‘But then where would I get all this blackmail material?'

"Then why're you complainin'?"

'I'm wasn't the one who felt like he needed to defend himself."

"I wasn't-" Matias pouted and instead said, “Fine. But I’m still the captain.”

‘Of course you are,’ Venganza said, and Matias got the distinct impression that he wasn’t changing her mind either way.

“Y’could’ve at least not get hit and get away,” Resigned, Matias grumbled before he sank into the captain’s chair, the leather soft and pliable and worn-down from years of use. The padding had long been shifted to fit his shape - a testament to the age of the entire ship, despite the new sealants and shiny console. He let out a sigh of relief in the dark, stretching out in the seat, the only light now coming from the orangey glow of the engine lights and scorching hot metal coming from the outside shell of the ship, presumably were the plasma blast had hit them dead on, “You know perfectly well that we coulda dodged that.”

‘But it would be less fun that way!’

“The last thing you need is more fun,” Matias grunted, glancing at the clumsily installed clock on the wall of the engine room, which read 2:79 A.M. Valentime, "N'case you didn't know, your version of 'fun' would be traumatizing someone for life and hitting us straight in our non-existin' wallet."

H-47 would’ve barely been rising.

_It’s too damn early to be awake._

Matias slid out of his chair and lumbered out of the room to head to the kitchenette, to coax some coffee out of the machine, and continued, with a sly grin, “Speakin’ of 'fun', did you ever clear that footage of that erotica off Lexi’s camera?" He paused momentarily to add, "I know it was you who did it, by the way. Ya ain't foolin' nobody, Ven.”

‘I never claimed it wasn't me, Matty. And which one?’ Ven’s voice followed him down the narrow hallway, where stars twinkled at him from behind the treated glass that spanned the ceiling and entire right side of the wall. The space between the stars yawned, wide and open and inviting, promising a different life, a different reality than drifting alone in the blackness with a voice to keep him company.

“What do you mean, which one?!” Matias laughed at the end of the hallway, where a stunted matter scrambler was laid carefully upon a pile of metal sheets that made up what could be considered makeshift table, and delicately dropped last night’s dinner into the funnel at the top, the once-warm fish and bread now cold and stale.

As he waited for the scrambler to start up, Venganza replied smugly, ‘Which erotica did you think I cleared? Because the answer is none of them.’

“Jesus Christ, Ven, you're a menace,” Matias grinned. He wondered, amusedly sometimes, if whoever had first developed Venganza had it in their mind to make her this mouthy. If Matias had been a lesser person and not the person he was today, he might have just contemplated jettisoning himself out of the airlock just to escape Venganza's never-ending stream of sarcasm and mischief.

‘Hm. He could use some more - what do you call it- _masturbation_ _material_?’ Ven mused teasingly, ‘And I thought I was the only one left in the galaxy that could drive you up a wall that quickly.’

“I’ll take that as a no,” Matias stretched and laughed between the rumbles of the scrambler scrambling up the atoms of cold food and rearranging it into coffee, “And sorry, Ven, you’re not the only who’s able to drive me up a wall.”

‘Who else would be able to? I want to make friends with them.’

Matias said matter-of-factly, taking out a cup, almost without thinking, “Well, sorry to disappoint, sweetheart, but that man’s been dead for a long-” before he stopped himself and descended into an awkward silence.

It was funny how months, years, _decades_ weren't enough to escape the past. Running had been the only option then, and it was the only option now, the depths of space swallowing up reality.

Venganza was quiet for a moment too, the only sound the uneven rumble of matter rearranging themselves inside the machine, before she said, ‘I'm sorry, Matias.’

Matias shook his head and laughed quietly as he closed the cupboard, finding himself staring out the glass wall towards the never-ending edge of the universe. The machine letting out a beep to indicate that fresh coffee was ready for the taking broke him out of his trance. He shook his head. Should haves and maybes were a thing of the past, “ ‘S fine, Ven, Davide’s been dead for a long time.” The missing rumble of the machine somehow made space seem quieter than it was before.

‘That doesn't make it okay.’

“Naw, I reckon it doesn't,” Matias hummed and instead, filled the cup with coffee. He punched a code into the control panel beside the machine, recalibrating the machine for the next time he used it.

He watched the swirling black liquid in his cup and took a sip. The coffee was black and bitter, just how he liked it. He took another sip and reinjected cheeriness into voice as he said, “Well, where’re we at, Ven? How far did that rift take us this time?”

‘Two weeks from Valentine, a month to 97. But,’ Ven added, ‘We are half an hour away from the dark side of Lumine.’

“Lumine, as in where Gray lives?”

‘No, the other Lumine that Gray lives on,’ Venganza deadpanned, ‘There's no other Lumine, idiota.’

Matias grunted and made out the way he came before a thought hit him.

“Wait wait wait,” Matias stuttered out and turned around, as if Venganza was behind him and not constantly surveying the entire ship. He cursed, “Don't tell me-”

‘Yep,’ Venganza said cheerfully, ‘Time for a new job, your favorite time of the month!’

Matias groaned and plopped back into his chair gloomily, “Why’d you do this to me, Ven?”

‘Because I know your hopes and dreams, and your hopes and dreams will not be achieved if you don't fix the million problems of this ridiculous ship soon.’

“Yeah, yeah,” Matias grumbled, “It's not like I was workin’ on one of the problems when you decided to navigate us straight into that plasma shot.”

‘Well then, think of it this way: working on the engine won't fix our almost empty fuel tank, or the thermal sensors, or the navigation compass, or the deflecting shield, or- you get the idea.’

“Yeah, no kiddin'- captain of ship with no people, fixin' a ship taking me nowhere, gettin' bullied by an AI. Thanks for reminding me of all my problems, Ven, ” Matias grumbled. He made his way back into the engine room, with its stacks upon stacks of newspapers and a floor full of gadgets.

Ven tsked at him teasingly, ‘Aw, I’m offended, Matt. I am totally more than just an AI.’

Matias regarded the mess before he pulled himself up into the captain’s chair. The air lit up around them as Venganza entered them into Lumine’s airspace, in a flurry of sparks and colored fire, quickly whisked away by space, “Yeah, well I'll be offended if we need to touch down for repairs again this soon. There ain't enough credits in the whole galaxy enough to satisfy all yer suicidal urges.” He swiped away the notification that the outer layer of the ship was reaching maximum withstanding heat levels for what must be the hundredth time as their tiny extravagance-class ship was maneuvered expertly to deflect radar signals before Venganza finally activated the cloaking procedure.

‘I’m not the one constantly putting myself in danger,’ Venganza said, ‘Unless, of course, if you count associating myself with you.’

“Yeah, yeah, real funny,” Matias gripped the armrests tight enough that his knuckles turned white, airspace turbulence and tactical maneuvers shaking the ship. His wrench flew towards his face, and he promptly ducked under it, the metal soaring over the chair, “So...I'm hoping you told Gray ahead of time that we were coming?” Matias asked, recalling the last time they were on Lumine, “‘Cause you know he ain't exactly the friendliest when woken up in the mornings, right?”

‘Nope!’ Venganza said, and the turbulence stopped as they finally entered the atmosphere, the panels on the outside of the ship capturing the colors of the sky above them and turning the ship into a chameleon. Ven cut off the thrusters, and Matias felt the drop in his stomach that indicated gravity starting to take its course before he squeezed his eyes shut and hoped that Venganza would land normally for once, ‘Otherwise you would have canceled on him, and we would be space-stranded until luck decides to pull you into an orbit. I decided this was more important than making sure he knew; I'm sure your death won't be that painful.’

When he opened his eyes again, they were falling through the air. Matias could feel his brain bouncing around in his skull as he promptly keeled over and gagged, nothing coming up.

About a mile up (and about thirty seconds too close to death, in Matias's opinion), Venganza turned on the thrusters again, and the ship slowly came to a controlled descent, inertia making Matias feel as if the G-force was trying to flatten him into a pancake.

Ven was being extra mean today.

Matias watched the ground approach steadily, and his stomach rolled as wind knocked the ship sideways again, “Fuck my life.”

Finally, _finally_ , the ship touched down, and almost immediately, Venganza threw open the doors and said way too cheerfully for Matias to be walking to his death for the third time that day, ‘Have fun!’

— • —

The entire planet of Lumine was built like it could have been a nightclub, rather than the heavily-enforced military base it was supposed to be, left to rot to weather and time. Neon lights decorated the planet’s dark side during the night, and shut off during the day to fool any passerby that this was just another little town in the system of H-47, filled with quiet little shops and even more quieter people, easily dismissed when compared to Valentine, a planet bigger, louder, and better for business, less than a rift’s jump away.

Similarly, the cities built on Lumine were modest compared to famous cities across the system, like Red District, or Bliss, or Atlanta. However, in comparison to Valentine’s prices, Lumine’s cost of living, shipping rates, and developmental rates were exceptional, and drew more than one young, ambitious, poor scientist to its “modest” cities, like Shevondire or Brandy.

The way the city came alive at night was surprising for any newcomers. Matias remembered his first time here was full of weary hours of unease, because he’s always known that noise meant trouble. Lumine’s residential districts, on the other hand, were very much the quiet little blocks they appeared to be. While the more urban parts of the city were rowdy, the suburbs and rural parts were quiet enough that a shout could travel miles on end. Unlike Valentine, Lumine’s citizens had enough sense to put in air regulation and pollution laws, so while Valentine deteriorated, much of Lumine remained unchanged by time. Prairies remained prairies. Deserts remained deserts.

Gray himself lived on the edge of the suburbs and cities, close enough to both ends of the pool to be able to get a taste of both. He claimed to have an affinity for the old Earthen animes rather than more developed movies and holovids that were portable (and in a language Matias understood), and liked to needle Matias to the point of no return. While most of the time he could be found in one of the many nightclubs and bars around Shevondire, absolutely trashed and high, Matias sometimes found Gray enjoying the peace and quiet of a cool spring morning, sitting cross-legged in front of his house.

However, it was obvious that Gray had most likely thrown himself straight into the deep end the day before; streamers and confetti and ribbons were strewn across the lawn, bits and pieces of plastic plates, cups, and forks muddy and wet from late-night rain. If Matias didn't know any better, he would've thought that an explosion had taken place here. Furthermore, lawn chairs were pulled up and down his driveway, and at the end, his hovercraft was covered half in duct tape, half in sticky notes, almost like they ran out of one or the other halfway through.

The morning was rolling around, and a beautiful golden glow was cast over his house, situated at the top of the hill, the next nearest neighbor on the opposite hill, and the next on the hill next to him, and so on. Gray’s house was simple: Two stories, a front porch looping around to both sides, and a swimming pool in the back, underwater lights still turned on, undoubtedly from whatever endeavor Gray was still recovering from last night, making it seem as if the water was purple and navy instead of clear, crystal blue, despite the weather being a bit too cold for swimming (or in Gray's case, most likely: skinny dipping).

Though the morning was chilly, it hinted at a warmer afternoon; Lumine's weather was pretty consistent throughout the seasons, and despite the residents' unconventional ways, the planet was very well-regulated, a little snug corner of the galaxy, tucked away from the public eye, a paradise within itself. It should have been one of those days where Matias could find Gray meditating outside.

 _Should have_ being the key word (key words?).

Matias felt his impending doom draw near as he slowly got closer and closer to Gray’s two-story house, the forebodings feeling warring with his wariness at the sheer amount of trash on the ground. His boots scuffed along the dirt and gravel, kicking a path through the bits of paper and plastic and glass as he slowly meandered his way up the hill. Halfway up, he stepped on a broken fork, the plastic snapping right underneath his left foot, causing him to stumble and slide a few dozen feet downhill from the mud.

“I'm going to die here,” Matias moaned as he righted himself, “Why’d we have to do this, Ven?”

In his ear, where a piece of plastic sat snugly and inconspicuously behind his ragged sideburns, Ven said, ‘Because you're broke. Now go, goddammit.’

Matias complied obligingly for maybe three steps before he stopped and said again, staring at the graffiti on the side of Gray’s house, “Ven, we don't have to do this now-”

Venganza sighed in his ear, ‘Oh my god, Matias, relax, he's not going to kill you. Just get up there and talk to him, mon petit chou.’

Matias whined, “Buts it’s like, five o'clock in morning!” He gestured at the horizon, “H-47 is like, barely up-”

‘ _Go_.’

Matias swallowed, “See sweetheart, I don't quite feel like bein’ killed today, well, really, not being killed at all would be great-”

‘Matias,’ Venganza cut in again, her coded voice descending into a hiss, ‘Go up the fucking hill, or forget about Gray killing you, I will.’

“I didn’t know you were capable of killing things without a body- AHHHH!”

Matias’s shout echoed loudly over the neighborhood as the earpiece shrieked loud static into his ear, and Matias clamped his hands over his ears out of instinct, which only shoved the earpiece in deeper, before he finally yanked it out. He stared at it, still able to hear the nails-on-chalkboard noise coming from the tiny piece of plastic.

The noise stopped.

He put it back into his ear, scowling. “Really, Venganza-” The static shrieked back on, “-AAH OKAY OKAY I'M GOING!”

The static stopped once more and Matias grumbled all the way up the hill, making a giant loop around the shattered fork. H-47 now hung low over the horizon, and the long shadow of the cherry blossom tree outside of the house was cast daintily over the trashed front yard. He skirted around the pool, a pink, inflated flamingo gliding over the water silently and gracefully, and made his way onto the patio off the side of the house, and finally, the front door.

He stared it down. The blue wood stared back at him, the gouges and designs visible, even underneath the paint. A breeze blew by, and he shivered, not removing his eyes from the door.

Matias jumped as Venganza growled suddenly, 'Don't just stand there, knock, _mon dieu._ "

"I was going to!" Matias protested, turning away from the blue door and thus losing the staring contest, "It was the door! Blame the door-"

The sound of said door behind him swinging open had him shutting up immediately, Venganza letting out a wry, 'Well, I guess that works too,' as Matias turns around slowly, as if what was behind him was his worst nightmare.

It might have been exactly that too, if the bags under Gray's absolutely murderous eyes and his crooked, hastily-applied mask said anything about it. If Gray was Medusa, then forget being turned to stone, Matias would be buried six feet under, so dead that no one would even be able to find him. The raggedy man on the porch swallowed, mouth suddenly dry.

Something akin to fire lit up in Gray's eyes as he took in Matias's appearance, leisurely, before he said dryly, "Well, good morning to you too, Matias."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did I do it? Did I actually finish posting?
> 
> Whew. That was something.


	2. Death to Killers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh hey, I'm alive.
> 
> Happy spring break to anyone who manages to stumble upon this!

Gray was a mercenary's wet dream.

One of the most famous contractor's of the underground society of thieves, outlaws, and criminals alike, he had made a name for himself less than a decade ago, three years after Matias set foot on a spaceship and never looked back, give or take a few months. The man supposedly hit a jackpot of jobs when he was twenty and started rolling in cash by twenty-five.

Put that together with living on Lumine's cheap infrastructure, and the system of H-47 has now got an extremely rich, willing to spend, _dangerous_ persona keeping away all the bad guys that know his name, who's surface view also made him seem like a young, lucky, and foolish little celebrity that any government or peacekeeping force could overlook with relative ease.

As far as Matias can tell, Gray was around 27 years old now, two years into his still-growing fame, and he's somehow been able to mask not only his presence, but also his real identity for nearly a decade.

In simple words; to the police force, and any other government in the galaxy really, Gray didn't exist.

For mercenaries, hitmen, spies, and the like, this meant that any job given by Gray was infinitely less dangerous. However, this also meant that any job given by Gray was also infinitely more expensive, and most of the pay that comes out of a job gets split 70-30.

For Gray himself, his position meant that he was able to do whatever the fuck he wanted, whenever, because literally _nobody_ would bat an eyelid if his bank accounts suddenly go up by a few million dollars in a night, a common occurrence as it is, and the authorities were willing to turn a blind eye for the man who was personally stockpiling the entire planet's economy.

In turn, Gray's lifestyle was evidently turning more and more frivolous as the years go on, and, if Matias had to guess, the man would be able to buy out the entire H-47 system in about another decade or so, if he ever had the ambition to expand beyond his simple little house on top of a hill.

Matias knew that he was dangerous. Anybody with enough money to be able to raise an army and a half was dangerous, because no matter the bullshit people make up about _happiness_ and _love_ and _kindness_ , money still controlled everything, from business to politics to the military. Not to mention that Gray was definitely of organized-crime background, which made him a figure of unending lies, deceit, and intelligence, his character defined oftentimes by a casual, childish charisma and bold, unparalleled confidence from his _I can't be stopped by anyone in the galaxy; try me_ attitude.

However...

"Ow ow ow ow, I'm sorry partner- fuck!" Matias's pleading echoed through the house as Gray dragged him inside the house by his ear, kicking the door shut after they entered, then continuing up the stairs just in front of the doorway. If the outside of Gray's house was simple, then the inside was _extravagant_ . Beautiful paintings framed the walls, depicting Gray's taste for bright, contrasting, neon colors, while the wide, open, and airy sitting room contained in it furniture made of spiraling, intertwined livingwood, infused with magic to grow into the desired shape and retain it for hundreds of years. The office, off to the side of the sitting room, was filled wall to wall with books, manga, comics, and souvenirs from various different places: an Earthen cup, with the words _I_ ♥New York painted on it, a frozen, Valentino flower, petals half-unfurled and covered with a thin layer frost, stuck in time, a purple-blue, floating glass orb from Planet Demesne, and other various miscellaneous objects bought (or stolen) over the years.

Matias didn't get a chance to admire the interior of the house or the tiny little aesthetic choices though, too busy trying to stumble along with Gray's fast pace half-bent over. Venganza had also gone silent in his ear, apart from the occasional snicker when Matias tried to protest only to be stopped by Gray tightening his grip on his ear.

"I shouldn't have given you that job all those years ago," Gray grumbled as he dragged a whimpering Matias into the kitchen, "Screw the money: None of it can make up the lost sleep I've had because of you, Matias."

Matias yelled in surprise and crashed to the floorboards when the pressure on his ear was suddenly relieved, and he groaned at the impact before rolling onto his back to stare at the ceiling, gasping like a drowned fish. Gray gave him a tired, disgruntled look before stepping over him to slink gracefully to the coffee machine beside the counter.

Matias rubbed his sore ear as he stood up slowly, feeling awkward and clumsy. Gray's kitchen was immensely different compared to the little kitchenette that was housed on his Extravagance-class. For starters, it wasn't a single hallway, _and_ it had a stove and actual place to cook, rather than just a matter scrambler that took whatever leftover food and rearranged the atoms to make more old food. The coffee machine, which was currently being used by Gray, was sleek and shiny, the sound of machinery whirring barely rumble as opposed to the thunderous noises the machine on the ship made whenever it tried to spit out something from its decade-old parts.

"So."

Matias stopped looking around and turned back to Gray, scowling when he saw the motherfucker leaning against the counter and staring at him, assessing him again now that caffeine had come into the equation. They held eye contact for a moment, honey-brown meeting emerald green, Matias feeling slightly self-conscious about his dirty clothes and unwashed face in a place so explicitly _clean_ , but unwilling to back down, before Gray rolled his eyes, reaching a hand up to lift his mask, and took a sip of fresh-brewed coffee, smirking behind the rim of the cup, dragging the silence out for longer just to watch Matias suffer.

Matias painstakingly watched as Gray downed the coffee in one go, before dropping his mask and turning his back to him to get another cupful. When the contractor turned around again, he squinted at Matias, continually taking sips of the bitter, black liquid.

Finally, unable to take the scrutiny and feeling jittery at being observed, Matias snapped, "'So' _what_ , Gray?"

"You're the one who woke me up at 5 A.M. You tell me!" Gray retorted, "If I didn't know any better, Matias, I'd say that you need a new job!"

Oh, another thing about Gray: He was uncannily accurate in guessing people's intentions and seeing through their bullshit. Which, wasn't that surprising, given that Gray himself has probably used every single lie in existence some point in his life. Still, Matias faltered at the truth of those words, and Venganza chortled in his ear, ' _You deserved that one, Matty_.'

"Shut up Ven, this is your fault," He whispered before gathering his senses and trying to collect a few sentences to say to save his damaged pride. He blew out a breath, his hair parting out of the way of the warm air, and took a deep breath, "I need-"

"Coffee."

"W-what?" Matias stammered, confused.

"You need coffee," Gray reiterated, shaking his half-empty cup at him, "I know what you drink on that ship, idiot. You ingest so much shit in yourself that it is a true wonder why you do not have brown eyes yet."

In a brilliant moment of _I-need-to-say-something-_ , Matias blurted, "I _have_ brown eyes!"-

And Venganza had managed to say drily, ' _Nice one, amigo. Way to prove you're an embarrassment to all of mankind.'_

-before Matias realized his mistake, too late, Gray's grin widening. He cursed internally for walking straight into Gray's trap, dreading his next words, and praying to god that he'll be able to get a job from Gray without having his figurative ass handed to him for the next few minutes with _casual banter_.

"Well then-," Gray bleped him, wickedly, _and yep he's definitely laughing at him_ , "-now you know why."

And _there_ was the Gray that Matias knew. The one that was a little shit despite being a grown-ass man, the one that was usually more _childish_ in the mornings rather than _intimidating_. Sometimes, Matias really didn't know which Gray he preferred: the one that scared the shit out of him but he knew he would be able to deal with, or the one that annoyed him to death, but was less likely to rip his head off and chuck the rest of him back into space to become one with the space trash that already existed in the universe.

For the record, Matias can blame his lack of social ability on being stuck on a spaceship and not having seen an actual human in flesh and blood in _months_.

Giving up trying to skirt around small talk, Matias dropped his tense shoulders and head and said wryly, "Good to see you too, Gray, you shit," before sighing and asked, "Is there any way we can get straight to the point this time?"

Gray smiled, almost to himself, "What can I say? Your bumbling is quite amusing to watch."

"So is that a no?" Matias asked.

"That's a no," Gray agreed and raised an immaculate eyebrow, "Do you still want coffee?"

"Might as well," Matias grunted, and Gray turned around to fill up his third cup of coffee and another cup for Matias, "Since you're so kind as to not spare me the small talk."

Gray snorted as he plopped in three sugars into his coffee - the man's sweet tooth was truly unparalleled - and said, "Don't push your luck, Matt; if it were anyone but you waking me up at five A.M., I'd have thrown them off the planet by now probably minus an arm or a leg."

"That's mildly terrifying," Matias said.

"I know, right?" Gray handed him his coffee - the one without the ridiculous amount of sugar- with a grin, "But seriously, stop waking me up in the mornings. Or at least, plan to _tell me_ when you want to pop by for an early-morning chit-chat. I might actually throw you off the planet next time, who knows.” Gray shrugged and took another long, drawn-out sip, smacking his lips obnoxiously.

"Is there a point to this conversation?" Matias asked, voice full of long-suffering, "B'cause Ven 'n I got places to be, engines to fix-"

"People to kill, things to steal, yeah yeah, I get it," Gray seems to deflate a little bit, and he threw a hand up, suddenly seeming genuinely sad, "No one wants to talk with me anymore."

"That's not true!" Matias immediately backtracked, even as Ven said in his ear ' _Don't dig a deeper hole for yourself,'_ because _dear god those eyes_ , "I'm sure plenty'a people want to talk with ya-"

And he immediately regrets all his life decisions up to this point because -

"Aw, are you one of those people, Matias? Do you wanna talk wiwth me forwever~" Gray teased, green eyes immediately losing their sad shine, and Matias scowled as Venganza laughed at him for like, the fifth time that day, "-we can cwuddle and watch movies and-"

"You know what, I'm out, goodbye, nice seeing you too, Gray-" Matias turned on his heels and started going back the way he came, ears burning red, Venganza absolutely howling with laughter in his ear, "-fucking motherfucker making me feel fucking bad about him-"

"Wait wait wait- Matias come back, I'm sorry!" Gray laughed as he raced after Matias, all former sleepy-anger and pre-caffeine grudges forgotten, "You want a job right? I have a lot those I think you might like, just please don't leave me!" His hand finally caught the edge of Matias's clothes, and the contractor pleaded, "C'mon, Matty, forgive me?"

Matias stopped, put his face in his hands and screamed into them before he turned around and watched as Gray beamed and put up a finger, "Wait here," and rushed off past Matias to scramble up the stairs.

Mentally, Matias blew out a breathe, counting to twenty three before Gray managed to scramble back down the stairs, this time holding a holopad and swiping furiously, eyes darting across the screen, tongue stuck out in concentration like a kid. Matias had to remind himself that Gray was a contractor and probably sentenced more people to death this month than a serial killer kills in a lifetime.

"So," Gray said, looking up and startling Matias, his face serious for the second time today, "I've got a bit of a...special job for you this time."

Matias studied Gray, determining whether or not he was pulling his leg, and decided to trust him, "...Alright. Hit me with it."

"Sixty thousand units, untraceable, first of all," Gray started, "Plus an extra twenty thousand after completion and-" He put up a finger, "It fits all your parameters: Reckless, guns, cut and dry operation, death with a grain of salt, the works."

"Holy shit," Matias wolf-whistled, "That's a lot of zeros for a single job, darlin'.” He added with a drawl, "Must be an important job for you to call lil' ole me to do something like this, Gray."

"Indeed, except - " Gray nodded, his eyes flicking to the holopad for a second, "You won't have to kill anyone."

"What?"

"I said you don't need to kill anyone."

Matias wrinkled his nose, suspicious, "You also said-"

"Death? Yeah. But I did say _with a grain of salt._ My- the client listed it as infiltrate and steal."

' _We'll take it,'_ Venganza suddenly said, and both Matias and Gray jumped as her synthetic voice projected out from the earpiece still nestled in Matias's ear.

"Venganza?" Gray questioned, relaxing and brushing off nonexistent dust off his sleeves, "Oh, good timing,  Was just about to transfer the data to you anyways."

As if on cue, a ding sounded from Gray's holopad, and he seemed satisfied, "Done. You should be able to see it by the time you exit the airspace. I assume you'll be gone soon?"

Matias adjusted his cloak and confirmed, "Yeah, job sounds good so far. Keep a backup for me just in case though."

"Way ahead of you, my friend."

Matias mused thoughtfully, "Infiltrate and steal, huh? Sounds like my kinda job."

"You pick up a thing or two about your mercenaries after some cooperation," Gray said vaguely, and then shuddered, "I know way too much stuff that I don't need to know about you."

Matias laughed and replied, "Well, that's the downside of workin' with a fella like me." He put Gray's coffee cup down on a small table that was against the hallway wall, and gave Gray a two-finger salute before turning towards the blue door, "See ya soon, Gray."

"Farewell," Gray waved cheerily at Matias's retreating back as the mercenary opened the door and stepped out, hesitating over the doorway for a split second before stepping out into the porch, the door swinging shut with a tiny click.

On his holopad, a notification popped up.

_From G. J: Did you do it_?

Gray sighed and strode over to the sitting room, throwing himself dramatically over one of the couches before turning the screen on again, typing back.

_From me: Yes. What about you?_

The notification pinged again. _From G.J: Done._

_From G.J: Let us all hope your 'friend' is as capable as you say. We cannot let the Daemonium slip by again._

_From me: Of course, brother._

Gray stared at the screen and pulled up the contract page again, skimming over the mission log, eyes landing on the words _Assigned by: Com.der. D.C._ instead, followed by _possible death_ and _betrayal_.

Gray was silent for a moment before he lowered his holopad and said quietly, to empty space, "What's death to killers like us, Matias?"  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can't lie, this chapter was pre-written, and I'm kinda concerned about some plot details that I think I've been meaning to change but...  
> ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ Oh well(?)


	3. A Pretty Planet With Pretty Faces

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Boy howdy, that took a long time to update, didn’t it? Haha.......sorry?

For once in his life, Matias truly considered maybe ditching the on-the-run life to settle down. Start a family, grow a garden, cook some old Earthen dishes, die peacefully.

Gray’s mission had sent them into another star system around three rifts away, the trip taking more or less two weeks, during which Matias learned that the client he was supposed to aid in _infiltrating_ and _stealing_ lived on Planet Zero.

If Lumine was a hidden treasure, then Zero was a public haven. The planet has won multiple awards (given by the council of the Clustre Galaxy every ten years) for not only _most popular_ in the past three decades, but also for _most populated_ and _most environmentally-friendly_ . Valentine, of course, received _best commerce center_ , but Zero was a close second, with about a few million ships landing and leaving its ports annually, despite heavy security and a ridiculously massive police force.

Matias has personally, never been to Zero. So, he spent the two weeks’ trip up in space pouring over articles about the planet, learning the customs, best places to visit, amount of tourists, statistics and analytics and the sort, while Venganza worked her multitask wonders, navigating the ship past another two space pirate encounters - one of which _actually_ had super-fusion plasma, and the other which tailed them for about three hours before giving up and heading back towards the H-47 trash zone - , deflecting at least 103 scans, and creating convincing enough credentials for Matias to walk onto Zero without immediately being busted by the police there.

After all, Matias wasn't Gray, so he was _most definitely_ on the universe's list of _top-10-most-wanted-criminals_. Venganza often gave him a lot of shit about having to do so much work because his younger self didn't have the sense to keep a low profile.

So, when Venganza finally landed in Zero's public landing area, disguised as a citizen-class ship, out stepped Mr. Josiah Myles of Shevondire, Lumine, former associate and dear friend of Grayson Ricardo.

Gray once told him that if he ever got into a tight spot, _to feel free to use me as a scapegoat, but not too much because I will hunt you down if you cause me trouble._

Matias figured that, hey, he hasn’t got more decency than that, so he might as well put Gray there as a backup if anything happened.

So far, the shiny, new ID has gotten him past three lines of security. First, into the Aestas system, then into Zero airspace, and finally, past universal security at around 400 miles too far from the city where he needed to be. Matias was about to pass his fourth checkpoint after traveling about 399 miles closer by hovertrain, then the last two miles by foot. The entire ordeal took him about six hours, which put him at least three hours behind for the surveillance schedule he had originally set up before he arrived.

_Guess it'll have to wait 'till tomorrow_ , Matias thought, a bag slung over his shoulder, as he stepped off the hovertrain and murmured a quick _excuse me_ to push past some dawdling passengers, _Shame. Planet's real pretty too. Guess we can save the sightseein' for later._

' _Security,'_ Venganza whispered in his ear, drawing him out of his reverie, ' _Bolo, Matty_.'

"Hello, gentlemen," Matias greeted the guards as he approached, the lines short and sparse, given how late the time is - hovertrain's here were more local than transcontinental, so most people who used them were workers who unfortunately had jobs and homes separated by dozens of miles of city, or business associates who had come into this side of Winter to do business. Which meant that during the nights, scant few people actually used the hovertrains, only those unlucky enough to have worked overtime shifts and thus missed the 3-5 o'clock rush hour.

Matias gave them his best disarming smile, laying his charm on thick as he drawled, "Mighty fine place ya'll got here."

"Yes," Said one of them, nose wrinkling almost imperceptibly at his lisping accent, "Planet Zero is currently one of the fastest developing planets in the known systems. Most of the people here are very privileged and are well-known contributors to the system-wide economy," The guard bowed, "Is this your first time here, Sir?"

"Sure is," Matias rubbed his nose and chuckled as the other guard put his bag through a metal detector, scanning for weapons and the like, "Needed a vacation from work. Got a recommendation from a friend. Don't worry,” He winks, “I've only heard good things 'bout this place."

The guards didn't seem privy to responding to that, so Matias instead rocked on his heels and hummed as the guards poked through every belonging he brought with him: A laptop, a pair of chopsticks, and another bag containing little round candies.

Satisfied with their inspection, the guards bowed once again and said in unison, "Welcome to Zero, Mr. Myles, we hope you enjoy your stay."

With a wink and a tip of a hat he had used as a disguise, Josiah Myles stepped out of the hovertrain station and into the bustling night time of Winter City. Steam rose up from the sides of the roads from underground hot springs and faded into the chilly air, any passerby who needed to stop and make a phone call or catch up with friends conveniently hanging around these warm spots. Ramen shops and restaurants littered the sides of the busy street, bright with antique, neon-colored signs, or wooden logos dotted with tiny, fiber-optic light cables. The entire scene contrasted nicely against the red-purple backdrop of the sky, the city lights reaching so far up that they disappeared into the cloud cover.

The cold caused Matias to retreat slightly into the confines of his large, soot-colored trench coat, burying his nose into the high collar. It was one of those days where the sun was setting in between the mountains, just barely able to be seen past the two hulking landforms, casting a beautiful shadow over the city. Golden hour had just passed, it seemed, and Matias saw people all around starting to bid their friends a good night, some small-scale stores that didn't operate into the night cleaning up and turning the signs on the door from _open_ to _closed_.

Originally, he thought that if he'd ever settle down, it would probably end up being some ramshackle, run-down, abandoned building down in Valentine, or maybe crashing for the rest of his life at Gray's. But now, he changed his mind. If Matias could settle down anywhere in the 'verse, it would be here, on Zero, where the sun set slowly, and time moved in molasses pace compared to the rest of the world.

What was it that had driven him up into space all those years ago anymore. Obligation? Fear? The past?

Huh, must be another person.

"Beautiful city, i'n't, Ven?" Matias said from behind the collar, feeling the tip of his nose turn pink from the cold even within the confines of the jacket, "We should come 'ere more often after this." His breath puffed out from the collar of the jacket, rising up and bringing the warmth with it as it disappeared.

' _I advise against it strongly, given our track record of what happens to planets we have come into contact with_.'

Matias pouted and pulled the brim of his hat lower with a glove-covered hand, "We could ask Gray for temporary immunity?"

' _And have half the universe on our tails the moment we come off? Absolutely not.'_

_"_ That sounds like a plan to me," Matias laughed quietly, as not to alert any passerby to a tourist in a hat, walking around and talking to himself, "It's not like you don't already have a plan prepared for when that happens."

' _You'll be sorry when you come crawling back to me with more than a few scrapes and scratches. I'm trying to keep you alive, Matias.'_

_"_ Hey, everyone dies at some point, right?" Matias said, making his way the hotel Venganza had managed to book for him remotely a few days ago, and admiring the way the pastel, twilighted dusk brushed against the skyscrapers softly, "I reck'n mine'll just be a little more gruesome than others." He contemplated for a second, "Well, either that or more lonely, which is kind of depressin' to think about."

' _I'm sure Gray will miss you.'_

"Him? Nah, he'll probably be thanking' whatever God's out there for gettin' rid o'me."

' _I would never get rid of you_.'

"Well, you ain't god, Ven."

The city's night sounds rivaled those of Lumine, rowdy and appertaining to the culture there perfectly, though it certainly wasn't as colored as Gray's hometown, most of the signs just normal LED lights, though notably very well-kept and repaired. The streets were made of some sort of synthetic asphalt, absorbing some, but not all, of the sounds of pedestrians and animals running around. However, as Matias walked down the streets, he became aware to a set of footsteps following his own, the _thip thip_ of boots defined and unhidden as he got closer and closer to his hotel.

Did someone already recognize him? (Or rather, did someone already recognize his bounty?) _Christ_.

' _There's someone tailing you, amigo,'_ Venganza said, _'He's very close, if you get what I mean.'_

_"_ I know, sweetheart, I hear 'em," Matias said, barely moving his mouth, "But he ain't jumped on me yet, and he's too loud for a professional assassin. I 'spect he's a spy, maybe local police. He shouldn't be a problem, long as we play our cards right. Hell, maybe he’s one of Gray’s - you know he keeps friends everywhere. It ain’t gonna be the first time he sent someone to keep an eye on us."

Venganza hummed, unconvinced, but didn’t say anything else on the matter.

A hundred feet from the hotel, his tail was still following him. Not local police then. They would have left after disregarding him as unsuspicious. Matias didn't want to give away his residence for the night, so he instead walked past the hotel and turned into a nearby alley, dark and slightly damp in the corners, a protruding edge of a building cutting the width into half of what it was midway down. It was dark, and Matias could only see what was in front of him through a pair of special lenses he put in his eyes before he'd hopped off his ship a few hours ago, which conveniently gave him a sort of night vision that didn't tint everything green.

Satisfied that he wasn't going to get jumped from more than two sides, Matias turned around and waited expectantly for his tail.

Two seconds. Five. Twenty.

Nothing.

Chills rose up Matias's spine, though he forced himself into an even more relaxed state to counter the jitters he felt. He glanced backwards into the alley again, checking to make sure no one was there.

The alley was empty, but Matias could still feel the eyes.

His finger twitched, itching for a weapon, a bad habit and a noticeable tell that he hadn't truly gotten rid of. It was unfortunate that Zero's security was high; he had to leave behind all his little gadgets (which, in all likelihood probably would have warranted him getting escorted off the planet by peacekeepers and universal guards in handcuffs). It was even more unfortunate that even with Venganza'a help, sneaking a weapon onto his person was still highly risky, the sole reason that caused him to be unarmed right now, apart from his wits and his fists. This was exactly the reason why Matias always kept a weapon on him.

Briefly, Matias wondered if tonight was going to be the last night for him before mentally slapping himself and focusing.

However, before Matias could truly start pinpointing where his tail was, the feeling of being watched faded, and Matias let out a huffing breath, eyes still darting around. _Must have been one of Gray's_.

He relaxed imperceptibly and took a few moments to steady himself before wasting no time to stride out of the alley the way he came, keeping an ear peeled for any sounds behind him while he whistled a tune nonchalantly, stepping back out into the lights of the main street.

He’s gotta tell Gray to stop sending lackeys.

Just to be careful, Matias made another loop around the block to make sure his would-be-stalker, if he (a she?) was still following him, would have been thoroughly confused before finally entering his booked hotel, paying a little extra to the front desk for his more-than-a-little-late arrival. He took the elevator up to the seventh floor, putting on a show of swaggering to his room for the cameras, before the door clicked shut behind him and he sighed, dropping his small bag.

With little more than a shuffle of his feet, Matias bodily threw himself onto the bed, sinking into the blankets, mumbling, "Did you scan the room, Ven?"

' _Sí. No cameras, but there are two disabled listening devices, one at your 11 o'clock, and the other at three. I am monitoring the listening devices now, though I doubt they will be actually turned on during your stay.'_

"Yer the best, Ven."

' _I_ _must be, for having put up with you for so long_.'

Matias grunted, finally turning his face out of the blankets so he could breathe. He let the silence dwell for a moment before wiggling out of his coat, shucking it, along with his shirts and pants, to the floor at the foot of the bed.

' _Are you going to shower, Matty?_ ' Venganza asked through the shuffling sound of clothes.

"Tomorrow, Ven, tomorrow." He didn't think he could get up right now.

' _Disgusting,'_ Venganza didn't sound the least bit concerned, zero heat to her words, ' _Buenas noches, Matty.'_

"G'night Ven."

Matias would wake up hours later with a scream stuck in his throat, hand reaching for something, _someone,_ before waking up thrashing, tangled and twisted up in sweat-soaked blankets.

The urge to scream would fade, though his throat felt like sandpaper had rubbed it raw.

He would attempt to fall into unconsciousness again for another two hours before giving it up to keep a silent vigil instead, with his back pressed stiffly against the hotel door, eyes bloodshot, waiting for the blessed moment the sky would turn light again.

— • —

The mornings in Zero were, surprisingly, not as rowdy as the nights, the quiet morning vapor a testament to that as the city slowly woke up. This unnatural phenomenon might be due to it being the beginning of a weekend, Matias mused as he traipsed through the bleary-eyed morning crowd who were all in line in front of a little corner shop that seemed to be selling breakfast, from what he can tell.

Yesterday night must have been the night where everybody went out and partied until the late hours of the morning, because they didn't have any work (or school, Matias amended when he caught sight of some people who were _definitely_ minors, who were _also_ most definitely hungover) the next day.

It was like a Saturday on Earth, except that Zero's citizens got to experience a 450 day year, and therefore a 9 day week, complete with six weekdays and a 3 day weekend. (However, they did still have 24-hour days).

Matias ate breakfast at a tiny little sit-in cafe around the corner of his hotel. He sat at a booth towards the inside of the shop and ordered a slice of apple pie and black coffee, _no sugar or cream, thank ya kindly, sir_ , and wasn't disappointed with the hot slice of pie and steaming mug of bitter-as-sin liquid he got from the over-enthusiastic waiter. Matias got to witness just how beautiful the sunrises here were as well as the sunsets, having another playful quip with Venganza about returning to the planet after the job was finished while subtly winking at a few of the waitresses giggling in the corner and casting shy glances towards him. All in all, the day started out slow and steady, until Matias suddenly felt cold all of a sudden, a shudder racing down his spine.

Calmly and fake cheerfully, Matias set down his mug of coffee and bid the hosts farewell, tipping generously for their chipper attitudes so early in the morning as well as the first decent meal he's had in a long time, before he swept out of the shop, the brim of his hat pulled low over his eyes, senses super-tuned to his surroundings.

There were no footsteps this time, nor was there any physical indication that anyone was following him; however, Matias had always prided himself on his 'sixth sense,' which usually told him when danger was around the corner or when danger was _watching_ , like now. Matias grit his teeth when his trek down three blocks did nothing to shake off the feeling of eyes watching him.

' _Matty?_ ' Venganza asked, solemnly for once, probably noting his elevated heart rate and increased adrenaline, ' _Do you need me to track down our guest?_ '

Matias felt frustrated, because he was sure that the eyes belonged to the same person who had been watching him last night; however, despite feeling off his game, he wasn't one to readily admit help, especially when they were on such a time crunch for surveillance before the mission date rolled around. So instead, Matias said, "Naw, I'm good darlin'. Just," He shuddered again, before letting the words roll off his tongue slowly, "Tell me if it gets to be too much of a problem." He’s started to doubt that it’s one of Gray’s lackeys.

' _Of course, mon ami,'_ Venganza said before going silent again while Matias tugged at his sleeves, fingers curling and uncurling beside him.

Then, the footsteps from last night suddenly returned, and Matias felt his entire upper body freeze up.

His stalker was alarmingly close.

He kept walking forwards, not chancing a glance behind him, though speeding up. Whoever it was, followed. Matias was getting frustrated.

At the next alleyway, Matias turned and waited for his tail, just like the night before. For half a second, he sneered when there was no sign of anyone following him. Then -

The sound of shoes on gravel, and Matias immediately narrowed his eyes as a pair of boots makes its way around the corner, delivering the man into his line of sight. Raising himself to full height, Matias pushes the brim of the hat up, fully intending to glare at whoever it was and _intimidate_ them when -

Oh.

_Oh._

Matias stared at the tail, who had stopped at the entrance of the alleyway, with a confused scowl and a furrow still between his brows, mouth suddenly a little dryer than before. The other man stared back, also confused, probably as to why Matias seemed like a deer in headlights.

He was probably around Matias's age, maybe one or two years younger, and also half a head shorter. Sharp eyebrows, almost as sharp as the cheekbones, contrasted dark eyes and pulled-back hair, a few side bangs framing his face. A well-trimmed beard sat neatly around the man's mouth, a single ring piercing sitting on a pink bottom lip. Through a deep blue, almost black, cloak, Matias saw broad shoulders and and gold and blue tattoo stretching up from underneath the fabric up his neck.

He has got to be the _most attractive_ human being _in existence_ . Matias thought faintly, wondering if his heart was actually about to jump out of his chest. Chiarotti had once told him that he was too easily swayed by a pretty face and a good lay. _No fraternization on the mission, Galleto, è chiaro? I don't care how long your dry spell's lasting, and I don't want to know. You keep your dick in your pants, kid, and your brains in your head. I've got enough on my hands without you accidentally sleeping with the target, given your luck._

Matias felt his throat seize up, so he cleared it a few times, and tried to recover gracefully as he asked, with a lot less heat than he had originally intended, "Who are you?"

' _Smooth, Matty, real smooth,'_ Venganza told him, metallic voice knowing and smug, ' _What was it that you told me? Oh, right, 'I'm not that easily distracted, Venganza, don't you worry one bit'.'_

Matias ignored her.

"Mr. Marino?" The stranger's voice was slightly accented, with a faint undertone of Demesnian origin in his English, almost musical in its softness, "You are Matias Marino, correct?"

And _that_ snapped Matias out of his stupor, because he finally remembered that he was on an undercover mission, using a fake name on a heavily-fortified (but very tasteful) planet, and the entire point was so he can get what needed to be done _done_ and not get thrown behind bars. Deciding that playing dumb was probably the best bet, Matias quirked an eyebrow through his nervous swallow and drawled, "Who now?"

The man seemed even more confused, "You...are not Matias Marino?"

"Naw, the name's Josiah Myles," Matias lied. Then, laying it on thick, as if he was an actual citizen here, he scolded, "Now, I ain't sure who yer lookin' for, but following strangers definitely ain't the way to go 'round these parts, though its a definite pleasure to meet ya." He then unconsciously added, "Can I get a name to go along with that pretty face, darlin'?"

The man, who had been looking for him, apparently, immediately flushed red and spluttered, "I-I. What? Y-you," Before taking a deep breath and saying furiously, "You may call me Gino-” the man faltered for a second, as if he was shocked by his own name, “- Gino...Jacobs. I apologize, Mr. Myles, I did not mean to disturb you-"

Matias's vision tunneled as his easygoing smile also faltered.

_Gino Jacobs._

A young man in his twenties appeared in Matias's mind suddenly, laughing with stars in his eyes as he held up a picture with scarred hands, _Look, Matt, this is my brother. I want him to join us eventually._

_Whiskey and beer by the beach. Teasing his crush on the medic. Fluffing up his bleached tips to protests and swats._

Then Matias saw fire, and he heard his own scream and saw so much fire and smoke and ash-

_'You can't save him, kid!' That was Chiarotti's voice, and Matias was screaming himself hoarse, struggling against Davide's grip, 'There's nothing you can do; he's gone! Goddammit, kid, go before you're gone too!'_

All and any good humor left Matias suddenly, because there was only one person named Gino in this entire world who would know how to find him, and this stranger _was not him_ , because Gino was dead, along with Alejandro, and Davide, and Enzo and-

Without a second thought, Matias grabbed the man's collar and yanked him off the ground before smashing him against the alley wall, snarling, " _What_ did you say your name was?"

The stranger had yelped when he was roughly yanked from his feet and let out a pained groan now, blinking a few times before realizing what happened. Almost as fast as Matias reacted, the man's expression changed from confused to angry, and suddenly, the alley became engulfed in an almost blinding golden glow, and Matias barely had a moment to comprehend what was happening when he was roughly jerked backwards off the man, howling as light burned into his eyes and his skin.

The air was on fire. His mouth tasted like metal.

Then it all stopped, ending just as fast as it began, and he was panting on the ground, blinking in a daze, limbs unresponsive. The light had disappeared, but the feeling of sunburn on his skin didn't leave, nor did the spots behind his eyelids or the taste of batteries on his tongue.

Two black boots stepped in front of him, and Matias felt two finger hook under his chin and jerk his head up roughly, a pair of dark eyes now glowing bright white, fury still prominent in them, "How crass. I had been warned that people on Zero are all very pompous. Perhaps prone to violence. I did not expect them to be true. No matter. It is not the first time I have been wrong."

The fingers tightened before they released him completely, and Matias coughed as his head slumped down, the world finally merging into one picture. He struggled to look up. The stranger was throwing him one final look of disgust when Matias managed to wheeze, "How'd you know Gino?"

The stranger froze, before that carefully crafted sneer was back, "That is none of your concern."

"So t's not yer name," Matias slurred.

"No," The stranger said stiffly before rolling his shoulders, turning his back to Matias to walk towards the alleyway entrance. He paused there and looked over his shoulder, saying flatly, "Goodbye Mr. Myles. I hope we do not meet again."

Then, leaving Matias, still slumped against the alley wall, the pretty stranger-who-was-not-Gino disappeared around the corner, leaving no trace that he had ever been there in the first place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don’t really know what to say except that all this was typed on my phone, so I’ll fix any possible formatting problems...tomor- *ahem* - eventually.


	4. Not Your Blood

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story really needs a rewrite. Idk what I was thinking last year XD.

"I changed my mind, Ven," Matias had groaned when he had managed to drag his ass back to the hotel room, wincing as his muscles spasmed. He had spent a good fifteen minutes in the alleyway, dazed, drifting in and out of unconsciousness and hysteria before coming back to himself and realizing that his body was basically dead weight when he had tried to move it, "I hate this place. We're never comin' back after this."

Venganza sighed, ' _ I warned you, didn't I? _ '

"The dude was a Hellfire, Ven," Matias babbled, "I ain't seen a Hellfire in a decade- I didn't know they even existed anymore, and now one of 'em shows up and claims to be Gino and-"

' _ You need to breathe, Matty.' _

_ "I know _ !" Matias hissed, clenching his eyes shut, feeling a headache pounding at his temples. The past was trying to infiltrate his brain, and he was too stubborn to let it control him anymore, "But are you  _ listening _ to me Ven? That dude was-!"

' _ Yes! I know, ingrate!'  _ Venganza cut in, snarling over Matias, and Matias shut up at that, because Venganza rarely ever lost her cool , her AI programming prohibiting excessive use of anger unless in dangerous situations, ' _ He's a Hellfire! I know, because you've said it no less than five times already!'  _ Venganza's voice buzzes in angry static, ' _ But the more you panic, the less you are able to use that brain of yours! Do you know how fast your heart rate is right now? Do you? Do you remember what happened the last time this happened? Because I don't think you remember the way you woke back up and realized that you were covered head to toe in blood  _ **_that isn't yours_ ** !'

Matias swallowed down a ball of anger, indeed feeling his heart beating way too fast for it to be normal, and feels the rush of adrenaline still burning in his veins, now noticing the less-responsive movements of his limbs, and the fading edges around his vision, after he stopped and looked. But, even if his body needed to power down, his mind argued furiously.

"Whatever," He scoffed and turned his back on the camera he had planted in his hotel room, where Venganza was watching his every movement, "It's not like you can understand."

Venganza made a noise that a human would in the back of their throat, the sound static and high-pitched, like an angry kettle emitting steam. For a moment, Matias wondered if he went too far. After all, Venganza was no less human than some of his former associates, who didn't give a shit about humor and friendship and silence like Venganza did-

Matias growled and slammed a fist onto the wall, the thud echoing around in his ears and his head. Silence from both of them. Then-

' _ Get a grip, amigo, and tell me when you've sorted out your shit, _ ' Venganza said, stiffly, before static sounded in his ear, indicating that not only did she go silent, she completely shut off her systems until Matias wanted to turn her back on again.

— • —

A day and a half had passed since the "Hellfire incident," as Matias had taken to calling it, and between Venganza deactivating and Matias pulling his head out of his ass and finally reactivating her again, he had time to think and pace and agonize over the events that have occurred, to curse the ever-loving shit out of Gray, and to cry for no reason until his eyes were puffy and sore and his heart became lighter somehow.

Or maybe it just became hollower. Who knows.

When Venganza came online again, the first words she uttered were, ' _ You look like shit, amigo.' _

Matias only grunted in response,  _ feeling like shit _ , rubbing his swollen eyes, feeling heavy and slow and  _ sad, _ due to his lack of care for himself in the past 36 hours. He was thankful when Venganza didn't make a sarcastic comment about his red eyes and mussed hair, on how he took twice as long to reactivate her than last time, on how much silence he still used to wallow in the past despite her presence, and a million other tiny little details that he definitely noticed about himself, but didn't bother to fix.

After all, you can't fix something that's missing its own pieces.

— • —

Sleep helped.

Matias didn't actually realize he fell asleep until he woke up, the sun streaming through the curtains he forgot to close last night - a rookie mistake that made him feel a little better, somehow - , casting a warm beam of light through the still air, the particles in the air floating by lazily, creating an almost-halo effect on the small patch of carpet the sun decided to smiled upon this morning.

When he moved, he'd found that his muscles didn't quite scream at him as much as he expected, and that - he threw a glance at the clock on the nightstand - fourteen hours of sleep somehow made the entire ‘Hellfire incident' seem less important than it had been fourteen hours ago.

' _ Finally back to the land of the living?' _

Matias chuckled and popped his knuckles, standing up and stretching, finding that he was actually okay with being behind on surveillance for a day and a half, because this is the most refreshed he's felt in a long time. The crying must have vent out a lot of that toxic stuff he keeps locked up in his head all the time, "I don't know 'bout 'alive,' Ven. 'Half-awake' seems more reasonable."

' _ I think that is too much of an insult to the majority of the population that  _ **_is_ ** _ half-awake right now, _ ' Venganza immediately said back, no more coldness left in her voice, friendly sarcasm back in the inflection of her robotic tone, ' _ I'd rate you a 'half-dead' out of five stars.' _

Matias grabbed his hat off the hook on the wall and held it to his heart, teasing, "Aw, I'm flattered, Ven. Yer also by far the world's most beautiful bitch as well."

_ ‘A compliment? How unseemly for someone of your stature.’ _

"Any time, Ven,” Matias was thoughtful for a moment, “Hey, the guy that tailed me, you know where he went?"

Venganza asked unnecessarily, “ _ Oh, you mean the Hellfire? The one that called himself-.” _

Matias threw a deadpan look in the direction of the camera before grabbing the trench coat off the hook and slinging it over his shoulder, the other hand in his pocket as he left through the doorway, whistling a tune. He might not have been too miffed about being a day and a half behind surveillance, but he sure as hell wasn't satisfied with it. It wasn't his fault though; everything that happened on Zero was considerably more interesting than he had originally expected.

He'd always had bad luck.

“Yeah,” Matias muttered, “That guy.”

_ ‘He’s disappeared _ ,” Venganza told him, ‘ _ For now. You should watch your back better, carino.’ _

— • —

_ "Aw, but boss-" Matias was in the hangar, ships coming in and out of the sky-station, a deep blue sky surrounded the four sides with how high up they were, chasing after Commander Davide Chiarotti. He whined as Chiarotti spun around suddenly to shove his hat down over his eyes, sighing. _

" _ No buts, kid, you aren't coming on this op with us," Davide was dressed in a black trench coat, pushing a pair of aviators out of his face as he checked the chamber of his dual-pistols for 50 blasts each. Matias knew how many there were only because he had once been on weapon duty when he'd accidentally fallen asleep outside HQ, sending his team into a frenzy (Davide had been especially mean, snarling at him to go to the training room. Matias had thought he'd died and come back when Chiarotti finally told him to stop doing suicide drills after four hours). _

_ As usual, Commander Chiarotti cut an intimidating figure: dark, sun-kissed skin bulging with muscles, even under the trench coat, contrasted with even darker hair that peaked out the bottom of his beanie. Sharp black eyes landed on his, gold flecks flaring with that ever-burning fire, and Matias pouted. In return, Matias got a look of disapproval, "No amount of puppy eyes is going to change my mind, Marino. And quite frankly," The man paused and smirked, "I don't trust your luck." _

_ And Matias winced, because of course boss was going to bring up that mission on Demesne again, "C'mon boss, yer still holdin' a grudge over that? I thought I already made it up to you?" _

_ "You're forgiven, but that doesn't mean it's forgotten, stronzo." _

_ "But-" _

_ "Load up, boys!" Chiarotti shouted, and Matias watched as his team boarded La Mariposa. Chiarotti turned back to him and saw his sullen expression, sighing before clapping a hand on his shoulder, shaking him a tiny bit, the sigil of Retribution standing out against the arm of his sleeve, "It's nothing personal against you, Matias. At least...not in the way you are thinking." _

_ Chiarotti offered him one of his rare smiles before turning away to jog to the transport, calling over his shoulder, "Keep Alejandro on his toes for me, Marino. We should give those Redemption members a taste of real Retribution." _

_ As La Mariposa lifted off, Matias tucked his hat underneath one arm and replied softly, against the wind, "Don't worry, boss. I will." _

— • —

Matias's client was, to his disappointment, less exciting than he had been expecting. The entire ordeal, actually, had probably been the most boring thing that's happened since he arrived on Zero, which was surprising, because it was the entire reason he was  _ here _ .

The client had been maybe half a decade older than he was, hair going a little gray around the temples, a mask over his face when he'd arrived and a stern crease between his eyebrows, muffled voice proclaiming that he was  _ late _ . Matias had been unperturbed by the show of disapproval, waving off the protests good-naturedly and placating the man with a few well-placed words through his own red and orange mask. The client had peered at him with distrust, eyes flashing when Matias raised an eyebrow, lifting his mask for a brief second to scratch the corner of his mouth. The piece of cloth smelled like dirt and sweat, and it was definitely too loose. He didn’t bother to fix it.

The break-in was also suspiciously easy, and Matias was suddenly hesitant to step foot into the warehouse, all his senses screaming that  _ this was a trap, don't go in _ ! However, the client, seemingly unconcerned by the lack of sounds and people, walked in without hesitation, forcing Matias to follow because, well, he was getting  _ paid _ after all.

The situation seemed tame, but Matias didn't lower his guard for one second. However, he did nonchalantly take a plasma pulse pistol off the racks upon racks of guns to put in the holster at his hip. The warehouse was dank and seemed half-abandoned, if it weren’t for the piles of material everywhere. Dust streamed from the ceiling, a testament to the desert location the facility was located in. Matias rubbed the top of his nose over his mask, wondering if he would be able to hold in a sneeze if need be,

As Matias walked between the shadowy lanes of the darkened warehouse, crates surrounding him on all sides, he became distinctly aware of his own paranoia, a slow trickle in his mind, making his heart rate rise and his steps quicken. He swore he heard footsteps at every corner, saw shadows move every time he turned.

Perhaps the Hellfire incident had left a bigger mark than he'd thought.

Matias stiffened when Venganza suddenly whispered, ' _ To your right, Matty,'  _ breaking the silence and scaring the shit out of him. Pretending he didn't just nearly crap his pants, Matias grit his teeth and looked right. Sure enough, the crate they were looking for was there, the parcel exactly as described by his client, big and brown and unsuspecting, a blue and red mark in the top right corner. Minute tension seeped out of Matias when he saw the crate, and as he took a step towards it, his client came into view on the other side of the crate, face showing surprise when he realized Matias had found it before him.

Matias smirked and proceeded in taking out the bag of little round candies the security guards of the Planet had overlooked when he'd arrived as Mr. Josiah Myles. Taking one out, he put it on the padlock sealing the tops of the crate, and the sphere immediately latched onto the metal. With a quiet buzz of electricity, the padlock clicked open, and Matias took the contraption off silently, plucking off the sphere and placing it back inside the bag.

Again, this was  _ suspiciously _ easy.

His client took off the lid of the crate, and curiously, Matias peered in, wondering what in the Hell he was delivering that made Gray think he was  _ needed _ , because if anything, this op was a waste of his-

Guns, ammunition, and all sorts of metal lay inside the crate, and underneath that - with shaking hands, Matias silently moved the overlying items - prosthetics. Cybernetic arms, legs,  _ eyes _ , lay in bound bundles under the weapons and resources. What was worse - all of the items were covered in  _ blood _ .

The smell of iron drifted up, heavy and dense. His mask soaked up the smell before he could back away, and the stench of death was in his nostrils, in his system, in his-

"W-What the  _ hell _ ?" He choked out, his whisper barely audible to the ringing in his ears. His client shook with what seemed like silent amusement for a second and stood up, gesturing for Matias to do so as well.

Matias felt sick. He swallowed down past the bile in his throat, suddenly understanding why Gray had sent him on this mission. He grit his teeth, standing up on wobbly legs -  _ That motherfucker. He knew what was in the crate. He wanted me to see this. _

With one last glance at the box filled with the items of  _ fallen soldiers _ , Matias looked away to put the lid of the crate back on, sealing away the horrifying sight, determinedly not looking at his client's face as he walked stiffly to the opposite side of the crate, lifting it up with barely any trouble.

When he bent over to grab the bottom of the crate, Mathis discreetly took a finger to displace his mask a little, letting out the red scent of blood before looking back up.

He was ready to get this over with.

On the way out, Matias’s mind was a thousand miles away as he zoned out blankly on a spot of red paint splattered on the wood of the lid. (Or maybe that was blood?)

The moment they had gotten far enough away from the facility - about a mile out - Matias suddenly dropped the crate down harshly and then immediately regretted it when the contraband inside clanked noisily. Both of them tensed up, knowing that military grade cybernetic equipment could blow up if tampered with. When nothing happened, his client grunted, throwing him a dirty look before letting go of his side as well, more carefully than Matias did.

It was night, and the moon hung high over the sky, and over the desert landscape. His client opened the lid again, reaching a hand in to roughly shove out of the way the items that lay on top to reach the prosthetics that lay at the bottom - which was obviously the goal of the job, because those guns were pretty much attainable through more conventional means than this (as conventional as something can be when it's  _ illegal _ ). Matias took one look at it, not even seeing the contents, before the image of those limp arms and legs covered in blood flashed in his mind, causing him to gag.

He can’t believe people would take arms off dead bodies, even if they are cybernetic.

His client heard the noise and looked back up again, contemplating something before he stood up. Matias watched him reach for something in his pocket, and he stiffened. It was almost an unspoken thing on jobs like these - you never reach for a hidden object in front of hired people, because they have every right to pull a gun and kill you if they think, even for the slightest second, that you might endanger their own lives.

It took everything in Matias to not reach for the stolen gun at his hip.

Thank god, because when the client looked up at him again, he was holding a cigarette and a lighter between his bloody fingers. Matias hesitated to take it, both because of the gore and because he'd been trying to quit for about a month now, and he's proud of the progress he's made; however, his client shook it, insistent, and Matias pinched the roll between his index and thumb, mindful of the blood. His client dropped the lighter into his hand.

As he stared at the two items in his hand, his client watched him intently, and Matias decided,  _ fuck it _ , lifting his mask and sticking the stub between his teeth before cupping the other end to light it up, before turning around to stare out into the desert, muttering a, "Thanks, amigo. Though I didn’t take you to be the sharin’ type. Guess you really can’t judge a person by their cover, huh?" The first drag felt like magic, even if he wasn't addicted to the shit anymore.

He'd taken a few more drags before he realized that his client had gone silent, having not responded to his thanks, but also haven't returned to digging through the crate, the only sounds left the noises of the desert night and his breathing. Matias was about to turn around, the words, "You alright there, buddy?" On the tip of his tongue when the definite click of a safety being turned off of a gun made him freeze.

Slowly, Matias turned first his head, then his body, raising both hands up above his head when he saw the handgun aimed directly between his eyes. His client's eyes were shining with a fire that Matias had briefly saw when he'd scratched his mouth right before they entered the warehouse, practically glowing a manic silver, the whites reflecting the full moon. His grin split past the edges of his own mask as he stared at Matias’s face, devoid of the tiny piece of old cloth.

_ I shoulda kept my mask on _ , Matias realized with a start, blood starting to pound in his eardrums,  _ That cigarette was a bait _ .

Maybe his original suspicions weren't for naught after all.

(Maybe he  _ should _ have done the logical thing and just  _ shot _ the dude the moment he was reaching for that cigarette).

In his head, Davide said, " _ Your gut sometimes knows more than your head, Matias. Listen to it, and you'll stay alive." _

"Well, fate sure seems to smile upon me today," His client's voice was filled with glee, "Two jobs done  _ at once _ ? I must have done something right." He sneered and shook his head, laughing, though the aim of the gun at Matias's head never wavered. Matias could almost see the widening grin underneath that black mask, "I should have known. After all, there are only so many people that Gray could assign to me before he got to you."

The man tilted his head and said wickedly, "Hello, Matias Marino."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You know when you write a story, and then you go back and reread it, and it’s so bad that you just....can’t? Welcome to my world.
> 
> We’ll see if I ever finish posting this story, because I realized I have like twelve prewritten chapters averaging...a lot of words, and I’m barely halfway into the plot? Afterwards, we can talk about editing.
> 
> This is why we think things through before writing (and posting it, goddamnit), I think.
> 
> (This story has literally no direction, plz help me).


	5. The Man Named Matias Marino

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes you just have to consistently look at the date of the last chapter that you posted in order to kick your ass back into action. Sometimes, it takes a while. Like, a month. But it works. Kind of.

So Gray finally sold him out. Matias knew that he should have expected this outcome.

After all, most of his human interactions ended with a either guns to his head or knives to his throat, because he never had (and probably never will) the common sense to work together with people who weren’t all dirty assassins or thieves or anything of the sort.

He knew his bounty drew a lot of attention on the market. Venganza’s done him the favor of eliminating most of the electronic hits on him throughout the entire black web, but even the world’s most powerful AI won’t be able to stop all the contracts with his face stamped on them, especially those who are smart enough to do it in ink.

Last he checked, the price of his head, dead or alive, averaged somewhere around 10 million, and even Gray can’t deny that that’s a lot of cash.

Honestly, Matias wasn’t even sure, at this point, what he had done to warrant such a high price on his head. The only thing that truly mattered was that the ending of his life costs the equivalent of a small planet, and it got the contracts on him more than a few double takes and second looks.

The feeling of adrenaline slowly filling every vein in your body was both the most exhilarating and most foreboding feeling in the world.

On the one hand, that rush of energy feels great, and Matias will be damned if he hasn't seen any of his old teammates _not_ do something extraordinary whenever hormones come into play. On the other hand...

Let's just say that there's a reason Matias is the only one left from his squad, and even then, alone and drifting through the universe.

_The world has a funny way of screwing with you,_ Matias thought as his brain whirred at a thousand miles per minute, his eyes locked on his client's eyes rather than his finger on the trigger. He'd learned a long time ago that staring at the weapon was a mistake; the intent was always behind the eyes of the stakeholder, not the trigger-finger, or the hand holding the blade. After all, Matias himself knows just how easily people fall for lies when the person saying them shows the utmost confidence. Words and body language may lie, but eyes never do.

That is, unless you know how to hide it.

The client would have made a great mercenary, if only he didn't show so much genuine arrogance and glee in his eyes.

_That's what makes one person deadly and the other person lethal, Marino._ Chiarotti told him, _You'd do well to remember that. It's kept me alive, because nobody can read your mind except for yourself, and even the most ridiculous of bluffs will work if you look completely serious._

So, with a generally straight face, eyes blank and expressionless, Matias stared his client down, seemingly ignoring the current danger of a gun and half-asked, half-stated, "Gray set you up to this."

The wide grin managed to spread wider, and his client cocked an eyebrow and mocked, "Not going to deny who you are this time, _Josiah Myles_?"

A hot rush of anger was immediately dwarfed by a wave of adrenaline. Matias shrugged, concealing his internal panic and rising heart rate, "Naw. Don't see much point. After all, you'd already seen my face. I figured I'll get some o'my own questions answered b'fore I scram."

The man laughed, silver eyes flashing with a primal type of amusement and Matias's blood pounded when the sound sent chills down his spine. He feels oddly steady, and there’s a tingling in the back of his mind, and somehow, Matias knew that he was going to survive.

' _You need to calm down, Matty. Your pulse is starting to disrupt the reactors in your brain,'_ Venganza warned him, quietly, and Matias startles, a little,  ' _You will reach protocol efficiency in less than two minutes at this rate.'_

"You seem confident that you will get off this planet alive,” The man was saying, “But if you must know, Gray and I are...acquaintances, of a sort." The phrase was almost offhandedly given, and Matias was almost irked at the way the man talked, the small part of his brain noting what Venganza said even as he focused his attention to analyzing his client's words.

First off, Gray had set him up, and that, in itself, made Matias grit his teeth, because of course the universe would make the only person he could ever trust his enemy. Gray probably hadn't planned on him coming back alive, probably had a good laugh the moment Matias stepped out of his door, celebrating the success of another mission well done.

Well, joke's on him. Matias was going to _kill_ him the moment he got off this planet.

Second off... Matias stared down his client, the cigarette warming his mouth before he spat it out and ground it into the desert sand, not daring to move his hands. Any mercenary knows that even a _disarmed_ person would be able to turn the tables fast, if given the right skillset, so Matias wasn't sure whether the fact that the client _knows_ he was armed (and didn't bother to tell him to drop his weapons) meant that his client was stupid or just forgetful.

Matias thought the size of his bounty was enough of a warning to killers about _his_ skill set. Apparently, it wasn't enough of a warning if his stolen gun was still poking his hip bone.

The moon was high in the sky, almost directly overhead, and the light shone down on the standoff, almost like a spotlight in front of the audience of silence and miles upon miles of sand and dust. Every tick of time resonated in Matias's body, his mind unconsciously falling to another old habit, counting the seconds that the tension lasted.

The lack of a trigger being pulled could mean two things:

The man could be new and stupid to the business, though that was unlikely, given his age. The stupid ones usually came after him for the sole sake of money, not knowing his background or his skills, and most of them were young and foolish, new to how killing worked, out for blood and non-existent glory. Matias was usually softer on those assassins, sending them back with their tails tucked between their legs, and hoping that he gave them enough of a scare to make them reevaluate their life’s decisions.

Or, the man was and old-timer to the business, having fell into the rhythm of taking jobs and running, smart in their routines of researching, contracting, and killing, like Matias suspected. The smart ones came knowing _exactly_ what they were in for, usually more prepared than the stupid ones, seeking a revenge against something the past Matias had done out of anger and spite towards the world. Matias couldn't afford to be soft to these assassins, because he knew they were less likely to be swayed by well-placed words, or a wake-up call to their conscience. Most of these encounters ended with death, and an immense pit of guilt in Matias's stomach as he cleaned up the mess that ending a life brought with it, because _if only he had more common sense back then - less people would be dead today because of him_.

The only similarity between the two types was that all of them knew they would fail; and yet, they tried anyways, because if they succeeded, then not only would their bloodlust be satisfied, but a nice chunk of cash would be the handsome reward from whichever contractor (or contractors) that had put out a hit for him. And if they failed, well...

_There's honor to death, after all_.

It only added to the weight of the burdens Matias already carried.

However, the entire situation screamed that whatever grudge the man held over Matias's head was more personal than simply earning cold, hard cash. Mr. Silver-eyes here was an old-timer, and he was not going to make Matias's death swift and merciful.

_Well, fine then_ , Matias thought, _If dyin's off the table, then hell_ _if I'm lettin' 'im get away with an extra ten million units._

The stare-off continued before Matias finally reacted, raising an eyebrow. He took his own time looking the client up and down before deeming it safe enough to reply, "And you seem pretty confident that I'll _not_ get off this planet alive." Adding his own head tilt to his next words, he said, "- Say, do I actually know who ya are, buddy? I ain't remember Gray ever having mentioned someone of your description."

His client laughed, the sound sharp, almost a cackle, "That is none of your concern, Marino. The less you know, the better," He cocked the gun, "Not that you will be alive to cherish this mercy I will have given you."

' _A minute until activation. Matias,_ **_calm_ ** _down_ ,' Venganza is urgent now, louder in his ears than the blood pounding there. Internally, Matias felt himself freak out a little more. _I need more than a minute to come up with an escape plan_ **_and_ ** _get the answers I want, Ven!_

"Knowledge is power. The dead have no use for power."

The ticking of time was louder now. Matias could almost hear Venganza cursing his ass over to Valentine, ' _Goddammit ingrate, when I say don't panic, I don't mean panic even more!'_

The moon was staring at him now.

' _You have thirty-five seconds, get a grip!'_

_You know what, screw answers_ , Matias suddenly thought, _Make a plan and leave this shithole alive first, Matias._ Out of the corner of his eyes, Matias caught sight of the blood-crate. He focused his attention on the man again, who was sneering as his grip on the gun tightened. In his hyperaware state, Matias could tell that he was getting antsy, thrown off by Matias's calm demeanor and drawn-out silences.

_How do I do this?_ Matias thought with a nervous fury, _there are zero factors to use in this empty-ass desert._ _I've got a crate full of cyborg parts and bombs and-_

Matias stilled. _I've got a crateful of bombs and mechanical parts wired to explode when tampered with._

Matias eyed the gun his (former) client was aiming, and felt his own gun press into his hip, almost as if reminding him of its presence.

_Does shooting the guns and shit count as 'tampering with it?'_

The sound of a bullet sliding into the chamber of a gun made Matias freeze again.

Well then.

_One way to find out_.

Matias turned to the man.

_Five. Four._

With a shocking kind of certainty, Matias realized that his internal countdown was ticking in time with his protocol timer.

"Well, buddy, here's the thing-" Matias drawled, his eyes zeroing on the tick in the other man's jaw-

He was getting impatient.

Good thing Matias didn't plan on making him wait more than he had to.

The thought made him equal ways exhilarated and terrified.

_Three_ . Three seconds until activation of reactors in his brain, until loss of his conscience, until loss of morality to the most basic instinct to **succeed without fail** _._

"Dead men may have no use for power-"

_'Matty-,'_ Venganza whispered, ' _Please listen.'_

Matias would apologize to her later, about ignoring her advice. He's sure that she would berate him - _Of course you should listen to me more! -_ and everything would go back to normal, except he would have left a little bit more about himself here, on this planet, because he'd always told her he doesn't have the common sense to plan for a scenario where he doesn't leave without paying back his debts with blood. _Sorry Ven, I can't stop protocol this time, not if you still want me alive_.

_Two._ Two seconds until every command barked in his ear by Chiarotti would be magnified a hundred-fold, until his sight and hearing and smell would be sensitive to the point of unfelt pain, until a side of him that was made to not _feel anything at all_ surfaced and caused what had once been able to destroy a planet.

Each tick of time was suddenly unnervingly slow-

The moon bore down on the desert as a breeze blows past them, carrying with it a silver cloud of dust-

_One._

"But men like me?" Matias held his breath as he felt his pupils dilate in that one second, the world somehow warping to outwards, expanding his peripherals, the blurry, fall-away cacti now tall and ominous and clear-

His heart beat magnified-

Blood rushed to his ears, the sound a roar in his head, deafening in the silence of _everything_ -

Before Matias felt that tug in the back of his mind-

And suddenly, everything faded.

And the man with the gun watched with both fascination and wariness as the man he knew as Matias Marino suddenly stood straight up, his posture completely different what the profile said was his known-slouch, as if in the span of a second, all his senses were suddenly in sync with every detail of the universe.

And he watched, wariness bleeding to fear, as the man named Matias Marino caught his gaze with _crimson eyes_ , the color glowing a ruby-red, not quite the deep blooming color of blood, but not quite the red of feral creatures, a middle ground that was more piercing, more _chilling_ , than any natural thing in existence.

"Who's to say we were alive to begin with?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Am I allowed to give up rewriting (because I honestly don’t know where to start) and just pick up on the place where I left off? XD I really, really need help, because my muse for this has long since passed, but I’m in too deep to actually stop.
> 
> There’s 38,000 words stacked up behind this, and I really need a better plot with faster burn. Plz someone give me a plot.
> 
> Also, thank you, whoever it was in the comments that rolled for direction for me. That made my day. <3


	6. Blackmore

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Damn, I though I wasn’t gonna procrastinate getting this chapter out, but.....Oops?

_ Observe: 12:56 A.M. Zerotime. A mile from former Mes Compound. Currently in Mes Desert. Traveling at 45 miles per hour on stolen 4056 Model LumineTech HoverBike. _

_ Mental Condition: Good _

_ Physical Condition: Functional _

_ Emotional Condition: Uncertai- _

_ Redirect channel 5-- _

_ Unimportant. Evaluate status: Later. _

_ \--Redirect channel 5 _

_ Emotional Condition: To be determined. _

_ Analyze. ETA 4 hours, Bliss Highways. Take route to Tempo to return to Winter. Cut morning traffic. Regroup with Venganz- _

_ Error 101-- _

_ \--Entity: Venganza not found _

_ Redirecting. _

_ \--Error 101 _

_ Regroup with Class 1 AI [Retribution]. Gather belongings. _

_ Leave the planet. _

The world rushed past in a blur of red and orange and silver as the moon watched a man in a hat rev the engines of a stolen hoverbike, a trail of fine dust kicking up a trail leading from over the horizon.

His eyes were cold and expressionless, even as his mouth had the faintest upward curve. He didn't feel the coldness and numbness of his hands, nor the pain of the bullet wound in his arm, or the plasma-slag shot to his shoulder. Somewhere behind him, a man with silver eyes and a gun were laying next to shrapnel and metal, stripped of credentials and sporting a concussion.

On his hip, a pulse pistol and two knives, both of them bloody.

He didn't feel like Matias Marino in this moment.

Was that a good thing? A bad thing?

He remembered, somewhere in the back of his brain, where morality and conscious feeling was pushed aside, that protocol usually end in-

_ Error-- _

_ Loss of focus. _

_ Redirecting to mission goal. _

_ Reactors firing. _

_ Successful. _

_ \--Error _

_ Observe. 12:59 A.M. Zerotime. 2 miles away from former Mes Compound. _

_ Mental Condition: Tired. _

_ Physical Condition: Functional _

_ Emotional Status: To Be Determined _

_ Analyze. ETA four hours, Bliss Highways. Acceleration to 60 miles per hour. HoverBike Engine in need of repair- _

_ Redirect Channel 5b-- _

_ Unimportant. Evaluate Status: N/A _

_ \--Redirect Channel 5b _

The man observed, with sharp eyes, the amount of power left in the bike. Half charge. Should last 8 hours at 40 miles per hour. Too slow. Enough for 4 hours at 60 miles per hour.

A slight change in speed drew his attention to his shaking hand. He frowned and forced his hand to stop shaking.

Too many redirects. Too many errors. Reactors in need of cooldown period after deactivation. Estimated downtime: 4 weeks. Warning: System requires maintenance and is currently running on AI-controlled actions. Continue protocol?

\--Yes.

Retribution Protocol module 309 activated - AI access granted. Searching for signals...

Connected to Class 1 AI [Retribution]. Continue?

\--Yes.

Retribution Protocol module 311 activated. Access com link?

\--Yes.

' _ Soldier,'  _ Venganza's voice came online again in his ear, and the man immediately snapped to attention because the only person that ever called him soldier was Enzo-

" _ Hey soldier." A warm hand clapped him on the shoulder, paired with a smile, "Good work today-" _

_ Error 900-- _

_ Unimportant. _

_ Redirecting... _

_ Unsuccessful _

_ "-out on the field. Keep up the good wor-" _

_ Redirecting... _

_ Unsuccessful _

_ "-work, and one day I'll finally take you-" _

_ Redirecting... _

_ Unsuccessful _

_ "-out drinking like I promised, yeah?" Enzo's laugh was always a deep rumble, "Stay alive until then, alri-" _

_ Abstraction taking place to reduce stress on reactors. Auto-redirect will now be active. _

_ Auto-redirect to: Last known goal. _

_ Successful. _

_ \--Error 900 _

The man was alert now, awaiting orders, and it was quiet as she was assessed him with a full-body scan, his only indication that he was getting impatient was a tilt of his head, and even then, it was done minutely, with as much facial movement as a rock.

Class 1 AI [Retribution] hummed, ' _ Reset mission goals: return to city [Winter] to retrieve belongings. Regroup with Class 1 AI [Retribution]. Leave planet. Activate Secondary Protocol "Rewind and Reflect" upon first light. End of reset. Access code '211342663.' _

_ " _ Copy that, [Retribution], access code: Eggshells," the man said, eyes glued to the road in front of him, "Requesting reminder after 'Rewind and Reflect,' for last mission file sent by Gray."

' _ Request accepted. May I have the honor to know who I am speaking to this time?' _

"Alias 7, Evermore Black [Blackmore]."

' _ Welcome back, Evermore Black. Do you remember your last activation?' _

"Yes."

' _ Please clarify.' _

Blackmore grunted, "Unable to do so in current condition. May damage reactor function due to low capacity control over emotional status. Requesting evaluation status of on hold."

' _ Request granted,' _ Class 1 AI [Retribution] was quiet, ' _ Answer honestly, soldier: in your current state, would you respond to alias 2: Matias Marino?' _

Evermore Black - in the shell of a body that he knows houses himself and ten others - did not hesitate to reply, "No."

— • —

Coming out of protocol was a slow and painful process.

It was like waking up from a drugged-sleep, where memories of the first few moments that you wake up are undefined. Sometimes its easy to doubt they were even real to begin with.

Images come in places between the dark and the light. Memories are where they have no right to exist. Actions and words and morals that Matias had swore his life by were tossed around like they were nothing, and going back and nitpicking every single one of them was a painful process. A place where he should have done  _ this _ . A place where  _ that _ should have happened.

Matias wasn't sure if he was able to confront the past right now. Retribution protocol always left him feeling like he'd been scraped hollow and raw by a dull knife. Too long into it, and he began to lose pieces of his real memory, where the differences between aliases began to overlap, and he wasn't sure which person he was anymore.

After all, the consequence of being able to be whoever he wanted was always that he could never stay one person for too long.

Matias remembers that Gino had once described coming out of protocol like waking up a dead phone battery - you always felt cold and burned out and useless until you're recharged up again and ready for the next round of abuse from its user. A few hours worth of rest and some good food , some good booze, and Chiarotti deemed you ready to face the world again, as if you hand't just come out of a fight with death and won.

When Matias used to bitter, he tended steal Gino's words, spitting them back in Chiarotti's face on his worst days, " _I'm_ _just a battery, waitin' to be used over and over until I ain't rechargeable anymore, right Boss?_ " He would spit out the last word like it was sour milk, fists clenching and unclenching, because Chiarotti rarely ever used a desk to do paperwork, so Matias didn't have wood and wall to pound his anger into and to rage and vent through the darkest of days in life, where people he knew were killed and people he loved never came back from the field.

And Matias had always thought that he might have been the oldest battery in his little makeshift family consisting of Gino, Alejandro, and Chiarotti, and Enzo. He was so sure that he would be the first to be scraped hollow enough that there would be nothing left, but Enzo had left first, the one to finally see through the bullshit that was happening right underneath their noses, using this time to vanish along with his father to hunt  _ demons _ , no less.

Gino was second, killed in action, an explosion during a defense at Rush-thrift driving fire and metal into his torso and arms and face as he body-blocked his teammates from death. There was nothing the medics could do. He was sent with the ship back to Mariposa Headquarters, to be prepared for burial.

Then, Chiarotti and Alejandro fought through the entire struggle of the Ops being contested by the public when it discovered its covert division. Before a decision was made though, it closed down from another explosion where Matias has never seen Chiarotti act so terrified before, the man throwing him past a metal door that slid shut as fire poured into the room on the other side, and he had screamed and pounded on the door then, cried silently and mourned and then left after the funeral, taking up into space with him the past and its tragedies, its love and its hate, the life and death of a person he used to be and still is, even if it is buried under layers and layers of fake smiles and lies and charisma.

There was no regaining the bits and pieces of him lost during protocol activation and during the deaths of those he once held dear.

All he had left now was the ship. The ship, himself, and Venganza.

_ Venganza _ .

Evermore Black waited for the redirect, but it never came, and he settled down stiffly again when he remembered that Protocol: Rewind and Reflect, had been activated, and like untangling a piece of string, one part got tighter and one part got looser before the whole thing fell apart.

_ Venganza _ . Evermore held onto that word, the meaning distantly familiar and comforting before-

The first string fell away.

_Venganza_. Blackmore jerked as another mind stirred in the back  of his consciousness and another strand untangled.

Patient, knowing Venganza, who waited with dim lights as Evermore Black sat stiffly in the captain's seat of the ship, space and stars surrounding him, the chair that had been molded so perfectly to fit a person his exact size and stature somehow uncomfortable and cold, the flickering consciousness slowly seeping into his figure the only thing causing him to be holding onto the armrests as tight as he was.

If 3, 2, 1 Protocol was Hell, Rewind and Reflect was even worse, because you got to feel the tiredness suddenly seep back into your bones with every blink of your eyes, feeling cold and drowsy, like being covered by an unwarmed blanket right before you settled into bed.

"Ven?" Matias whispered, throat croaky and dry, and he winced when his words came out  cold and harsh despite their softness in volume. That was no good. Still too much of Blackmore left in him, "Are you there, sweetheart?"

The sentence sounded wrong coming out of his mouth. They were his words. His words but Blackmore's unaccented voice, missing that lilt that he had developed to be different than his other aliases.

At the noise, the dim lights of the room and the console flickered on and off in a deep purple-pink color for a second, reminding Matias of fluttering lashes when someone just wakes up, of Venganza finally acknowledging  _ Matias _ instead of Evermore Black, ' _ Welcome back, Matty.' _

Matias chuckled, low and wary, "One hell of a welcome Ven. You couldn't have convinced ol' Evermore here to take a sin in the sanitizer?"

' _ If you should know anything about yourself, Matias, is that any one of your 10 personalities is just as bell-headed and thick-skinned as you are.' _

Matias slowly stood up from the captain's chair, joints stiff and creaky, like old wooden boards, and he scratched his bare head, Blackmore having taken off the hat when they prepared for takeoff earlier, feeling his dirty locks matted with dirt and blood.

Venganza was right, when she had said that the blood on him after protocol usually wasn't his.

Matias felt every bit like a robot then, movements clunky and uncoordinated, tripping a few times on his slow hobble down the hallway to the matter scrambler, undecided whether he wanted a hot meal or just plain coffee. It was as if all his motions were programmed by a fourth grader first learning how to code, and he was stuck in the limbo of trying to find his happy middle ground again. Blackmore had always walked normally and without any off-beat to his steps. Matias always found himself favoring his right leg, the habit of once walking with a limp for 3 months due to an unknown injury from training. It had healed just fine; however, the motion was ingrained into his brain, and Matias had never bothered to fix it before.

Now however, Matias found himself struggling to walk in a straight line without falling, much of Blackmore's habits and functions still lingering in the post-protocol residue left in his DNA and brain neurons.

He didn't think he would be truly free of Blackmore for the next two weeks, nine days if he was lucky, with how long protocol had lasted this time.

When he finally managed to navigate himself in front of the matter scrambler, Matias found himself staring the machine, the thought of food or drink making bile rise and his stomach curl inwards.

' _ Matty?'  _ Venganza urged gently, ' _ You should eat something.' _

Matias nodded numbly and turned the machine on, the expected loud rumbling still managing to startle him, somehow. His hands shook just the tiniest amount when he deposited a half-eaten sandwich into the top of the machine and punched in a recipe for pancakes and coffee. Comfort food. Normally he would have gone straight for ice cream, even with Venganza's berates of him being unhealthy, but Matias felt distinctly  _ cold _ and  _ detached,  _ and ice cream would have just heightened the feeling.

As the machine worked it's loud magic, Matias gave in to his complaining legs and slid down against the metal boards underneath the machine, leaning his back against them and watching the stars above him pass by in streaks of white, blue, and red. The deep rumbles and vibrations travels through the metal sheets and straight to his chest, settling there to fill an empty hollowness that Matias tried to ignore after every post-protocol recovery session.

It might have been just him, but Matias swore that the hollowness got bigger every time he came back to being Matias Marino instead of Blackmore or Giovanni or Effie Bungalow, etc etc.

The pit of black and despair called to him, and Matias felt drowsiness drag at his eyes. And as the machine behind him beeped cheerfully to remind him that pancakes were ready, Venganza dimmed the lights, and the troubled ship captain, along with his ship and crew, descended into blackness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Any DnD players? My friends and I just started a new campaign and I’m literally incapable of writing anything when that’s all my brain ever thinks about.


	7. NaNoWriMo 2019

So, uh.....Been a while, huh?

Truth be told, this piece of writing leaves me confused and discontent, because I do not like the direction it is headed. I’ve been mentioning this for the past couple of chapters, and the fact that I have writing that I’m supposed to be doing (but am not doing) is getting a little...on my nerves?

For the select few that this story has drawn the attention of, **_this is not_** me leaving this work unfinished. I am currently in the process of rewriting and replanning the story, in preparation for NaNoWriMo 2019. I actually believe I can finish this work, even if it’s going to take a while. I am determined to commit myself to working on this for thirty days straight, this time with better knowledge of my own characters and my plot.

I just wanted to say thank you to everyone who’s been leaving comments and kudos on this work; it amazes me that people enjoy reading things made by someone less than adequate to be writing a book. I really,  _really_ want to do this story justice.

Thank you for your patience, and I hope what I spew out within November does all of you justice, as well.


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